Yang Youde is a farmer who had contracted to
rent 25 mu of land. The lease was set to continue until 2019.
Over the years, Yang has been raising fish, cattle, cotton, melons and fruits
on the land.

Last year, Yang Youde learned that his land
had been requisitioned. Since the compensation terms for breaking the
contract had not been settled, he has refused to move out.

Personal interests are trivial, but failure to implement official policies is
serious
Outsiders must not enter/exit at will, or they will be responsible for any
accident that happen to them

"The evictors said many times that they will
move on me." Earlier this year, Yang took measures to protect himself.
He took a hand-truck and removed the front. Then he put in a set of
rockets for use as an artillery battery.

On February 26 this year, a team of more than
30 evictors approached his site ready to demolish his house by force.
"At the time, I set off the rockets. They hid behind the bulldozer.
After the rockets were all fired off, they came out and administered a
thrashing on Yang. But they did not bulldoze the house
immediately. Instead, they only said that they will come back and finish
the job. Afterwards, Yang upgraded his defense by building an "cannon
tower" with help from friends and relatives.

On May 25 this year, a team of more than 100
evictors wearing helmets and carrying shields approached his home behind
bulldozers and earth diggers. "As soon as I spotted them, I got on the
'cannon tower" and fired several shots at them. They stopped. The
police then showed up and chased them away."

During the interview with our reporter, Yang
Youde reiterated that he was not a nail house owner. "A nail householder
is someone who is extorting a sky-high price. I only want a price that
is in accordance with government policy."

Retaliation and revenge is not allowed by government policy and law

Open and fair actions in accordance with the law
Oppose using public power for personal reasons

Yang Youde said that he will continue to
stand up against the evictors. He has "researched and developed" new
weapons such as "petrol bombs." He has also set up a couch on the cannon
tower so that he can be on vigil twenty-four hours a day.

Of course, it is dangerous to run a news report
just talking to one party but not the other. That would not meet the "fair
and balanced" requirement in journalism. Here is a news report in which
other parties were interviewed.

According to Yang Youde, he had leased 25 mu
of land. The lease is due to expire in 2029. During that time, he
could use the land to raise fish and food crops. Then the Hengda Company
requisitioned the land for a project. An agreement was reached between
Yang and the company in 2006 for 11.78 mu of the land, but the remaining land
was still pending.

According to the Jinyinhu Ecological Park
management, the remaining 13.23 mu of fish pond should be compensated at 2,480
yuan per mu plus compensation for the production facilities. The total
amount should be 75,919 mu. The offer was later raised to 130,977 yuan.

But Yang Youde found the offer unacceptable.
He said that Document 46 from the Hubei government in 2009 that the standard
compensation price for the Dongxihu district where Jinyinhu is located should
be 46,800 yuan per mu.

So the two sides could not reach an
agreement. Yang Youde said that he heard the other party was going to do
it "by force." So he prepared some fireworks for self-defense. On
February 6, a team of several dozen evictors appeared. He ignited his
home-made rockets and aimed them at the evictors. But when all the
rockets were fired, the evictors came forward and administered a beating on
him. On that day, he got help from his friends and relatives to build a
"cannon tower" as well as improved his rockets.

On May 25, Yang Youde said that several dozen
men came armed with shields and helmets behind bulldozers. This time,
Yang Youde fired several shots. Before firing, he used a megaphone to
declare aloud: "I kept mentioning Document 46 (2009) and the lack of an
agreement about the land." At the same time, he yelled, "This is going
to cause injuries on both sides." Yang Youde said that he was forced to
open fire when the evictors continued to advance.

Yesterday morning, Yang Youde was summoned to
appear at the Jinyinhu police station. The police said that they wanted
to understand the situation. The Jinyinhu Ecological Park management
said that the police are investigating the incident of Yang Youde attacking
the construction workers with his homemade cannon.

Yang Youde said that the police told him that
his actions were in violation of public safety regulations. But they
were considerate and only wanted him to sign a statement that he won't do
anything illegal in the future.

Yang Youde said that he was willing to sign
the statement. But he thought that "both sides had acted illegally."
He said that if the eviction team were to reappear, he would fight back again.
He asked for a additional clause that "I will not be the first to bring the
law" in the statement. The police discussed with him and ultimately
agreed to let him add that sentence into the statement.

Yang Youde said that the police also asked
him where he got the firecrackers. He said that the bought it at the
market. On the day before yesterday, four policemen came to his home and
told him to hand over this firecrackers because of violation of the public
safety regulations. Yang Youde handed over five firecrackers.
Yesterday, he asked the police to provide him with a written statement on the
confiscation of those firecrackers.

Yang Youde also said that the police asked
him whether he injured anyone during the two occasions when he fought off the
evictors. He said that his rockets were aimed at the sky or behind the
people. Therefore, nobody has been hurt.

Yesterday, the Jinyinhu Ecological Park said
that there were no teams of evictors as claimed by Yang Youde. Yang
Youde had attacked the construction workers sent by the Hengda Company.
On February 6 and May 25 this year, Hengda Company had sent construction
workers to level the 11.78 mu of land that an agreement was reached between
the company and Yang Youde in 2006. But when the workers tried to level
that fish pond, Yang Youde fired rockets at them.

Yang Youde said that the workers came near
his house on May 25. He claimed that the targets of the evictors both
times were the unsigned 13.23 mu of land and the house that he built on it.

The David and Goliath story of Yang Youde,
the farmer who decided to fight off land eviction teams with his homemade
cannon, attracted our attention and the team flew down to learn more. What
follows are details that didn't manage to make into our broadcast report, but
which I feel are important as they highlight issues concerning domestic media
censorship and local government operations.

A mystery vehicle followed us after our
morning visit with Farmer Yang, all the way back to Wuhan city proper. Five
minutes after returning to my hotel room, I was told some officials were
waiting to speak to us. I walked into the hotel lounge -- and lo! Seven of
them.

We sat down and a woman began to explain that
the initial local news article appearing in Changjiang Times about
Yang Youde was incorrect because the journalist only spoke to the farmer and
never approached officials for the other side of the story. She went on to
say that after her department spoke with the editors, the newspaper printed a
retraction the next day, though word had already proliferated online.

Her office took great pains, she said, to
kill the fraudulent story from 211 domestic Chinese websites. She concluded
that since it's settled that the story of Yang Youde is a fake, then by
implication Al Jazeera English's report would be perpetuating a lie.

Now, before our arrival to Wuhan, we had
called the said journalist from the Changjiang Times. He sounded
depressed and morose, and said he could not assist us in our story.

The woman then went on to point out that
other journalists, including one from Chinese state media giant Xinhua, had
shown up for the story of the farmer and his cannon as well. But all of them
had been set right on the facts by local officials. They'd all left without
publishing a thing.

A second official interjected, a Mr. Fan
Chun, carrying a load of documents in hand. I welcomed the rare opportunity to
sit down with officials to hear their side of the story. Far too often, we
place calls to various government departments and never hear back from any of
them. Mr. Fan allowed us to look over the documents, in one which mentioned
the local government would stand to benefit by some $95 million US dollars by
allowing the land development project to proceed.

"This is interesting! Can we photocopy this?"
we asked.

"Er. No," said Mr. Fan.

The documents quickly got pulled aside.

Mr. Fan then explained to us that China is a
socialist society and farmers do not own property. The state owns property.
Everything is collectivized. Therefore, Farmer Yang's demand for compensation
stands no ground.

The real estate market makes up 10% of
China's GDP.

We then asked if we could have an on-camera
interview with an official from the Dongxihu District. No one present would
give us a response. But after pressing the issue, they said they would get
back to us later in the evening.

The following day, officials did not arrange
an interview but a surprise press conference. Domestic journalists from Wuhan
Television were also there, filming the proceedings. They did not ask a single
question, so the press conference was essentially a conversation between
myself and a Mr. Feng Mi, the official who appears in our broadcast.

My first question was whether the entire
contents of the Changjiang Times article were "100% incorrect." Mr.
Feng did not answer this, but did emphasize that the men who showed up near
Mr. Yang's property were not from an eviction team. He did confirm there was a
team of men who had shown up "near, but not on" Mr. Yang's property.

Farmer Yang had told us he'd been thrown into
an unauthorized prison for 51 days, where he'd been beaten eight times. I
asked Mr. Feng what he knew about it.

The official explained that Farmer Yang
attended political education classes, a requirement of all farmers in the
district.

Al Jazeera saw a copy of Farmer Yang's
receipt detailing the personal effects he had to give up to attend these
classes. Listed were his belt and mobile phone. I admit political education
classes in China are unfamiliar territory, so perhaps it is standard for
students to strip down for attendance.

Our exchange lasted about half an hour. On
our way out the government building... we noticed the offices of the land
developers on the ground floor.

It has been a few days since our reporting
trip. We received a call from Farmer Yang, who told us men had not stopped
showing up at his home to harass him ever since our interview. He said they
interrogated and recorded each session. Farmer Yang also claimed a Dongxihu
official took pains to fly down to Guangdong Province, about a two-hour flight
away, to visit Farmer Yang's son in the military. A word was had with the
military commander there, and a warning given to Yang Jr.

Right before this report aired, Farmer Yang
called us again. Unidentified men had come, but in a case of mistaken identity
went after his older brother. They beat the man on the face with bricks, and
the brother was unable to see out of one eye and was sent to hospital.

We have called Dongxihu officials about
Farmer Yang's continued harassment. They deny any knowledge of what's been
happening, and suggested perhaps Farmer Yang was lying. In an attempt to fact
check, we asked Farmer Yang to send us some evidence. See below.

A farmer who recently made headlines for
firing homemade rockets to expel demolition corps from his land returned to
defend his farm on Wednesday, a day after four unidentified men assaulted his
brother.

Since February, Yang Youde, a 56-year-old
farmer on the outskirts of Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei province,
has twice fired rocket-like weapons at demolition teams who came to evict him
from his property to make way for the construction of commercial buildings.

Yang told China Daily on Wednesday that he
had asked his elder brother to guard his land while he was away filing a
petition in court. "The four men must have mistaken him for me and attacked
him around 7 am on Tuesday," he said. "My brother said he was first
punched. The assailants then pounced on him and smashed a brick on his head."

Yang's 60-year-old brother, Yang Yide, has
been hospitalized with serious eye injuries. He added that forensic doctors
were assessing the degree of his injury.

Meanwhile, Yang Youde returned to his
farmland to safeguard his property. "I must hold on to my position and prevent
any intrusion," said Yang, standing on an 8-meter-high tower, where his
ammunition was piled up.

The police have warned him that the
possession and use of any explosive is illegal.

Yang said the demolition corps harassed him a
couple of times after his demand of 46,800 yuan (S$9,640) per mu (0.07
hectare) in compensation for his 25 mu land was turned down. He said the
property developer was only willing to pay him 10,000 yuan per mu.

Yang leased the land from the local
government and is its rightful owner until 2029. "Some farmers have died
protecting their rights. Compared to them, we have just been injured," Yang
said, adding that he would not give up.

Officials from the Wuhan Land Resources and
Planning Bureau visited Yang's family in a bid to mediate the dispute, but
Yang maintained he was not ready to accept any offer below his demand.

One of Yang's fellow villagers, surnamed
Wang, said Yang's aggression might just win him more compensation for his
land.

Yang said a Beijing lawyer named Wang Youyin
has approached him and is ready to assist him take the case to court.